Wedding Weekend Post II: A Birthday Dinner, Another Cop, And Last Minute Prep

I decided to call this series “Wedding Weekend” since it went with the theme of our wedding save the date magnets designed by my younger sister:

I realize that I have to start writing about our wedding eventually because more stuff that I want to write about keeps happening, and now I have a big blog backlog. I can’t keep bogging myself down with figuring out where to start, so I should just jump right (write) in.

The last pre-wedding post I did was July 6 (Wednesday). July 7th was P’s brother’s birthday. It was also the last day I worked in my office before the wedding. P and I got a lot done before his parents arrived on June 29th, but there were still last minute things to do—planting all my centerpiece pots, making the white wedding programs, stuffing the sagun bags, making the placecards, creating the flower arrangements. And of course I’m a control freak that was giving too much attention to every detail, so I was bad at delegating tasks.

The white wedding centerpieces that I made. I have a thing for funky looking succulent/cacti so I figured it would be fun to make dish gardens people could take home and enjoy rather than flowers that would die right after the ceremony. The table numbers were red construction paper pinwheels with "Happiness" written in different languages. Above is the "Nepali" table and the "Thai" table

White wedding place cards (can you tell the photographer sent us photo proofs?)

The white wedding program "fans" for the outdoor wedding on a hot sunny day.

Sagun bags, on display at the red wedding

Homemade flower arrangements-- red for the bride, white for the bridesmaids

While I was at work all day, P and his brother were “working from home” with their parents. I felt that it was tough to sneak out once I got home from work because I was gone all day, and the parents expected to spend time with all of us in the evening. I spent many of my lunch breaks racing around the city doing last minute errands, and I would occasionally leave work early but tell P I was working late, so I could have an extra hour to get things done. I kept thinking that a lot of bride’s feel stressed as the “big day” approaches, but they have so much more freedom of movement! What made me feel a bit stressed was not being able to freely run around and do crazy-pre-wedding stuff when I needed to. Although most things were in place by U’s birthday, I still couldn’t 100% relax until I knew that all the pieces for the two ceremonies were in order.

My mother and sisters arrived that Thursday afternoon, and I left work a little early with them so that I could help facilitate the C family and P family hanging out together at home.

A few years ago I was in the wedding party of a friend who got married on my 25th birthday, so I know what it is like to have a birthday when people are running here and there for their wedding stuff, and how special it was when they remembered, amidst all their organizing and planning, and gave me a cake and sang “Happy Birthday.” So we decided to take U out for a birthday dinner with a few local friends and our two families to give him time to celebrate.

Of course, as per my “bad luck” (telephone pole incident, tire exploding incident), as I was driving with my mother and sisters behind P (who was driving with his parents and brother) I passed a crosswalk, and then a cop on the side of the road motioned for me to pull over. I didn’t have a clue why he was pulling me to the side, thinking maybe my sister’s car’s registration had expired or something.

He came to the window and said, “Ma’am, do you see that man crossing the pedestrian crosswalk behind us in the blue shirt and jean shorts?”

“Yes?”

“Well, he is an undercover cop and we are conducting a sting operation,” (he actually said that, “a sting operation” as if I was on a tv crime show!), “and we are ticketing people who do not stop for pedestrians as they cross the crosswalk. License and registration please.” (This is a state law in Massachusetts BUT when I had passed the crosswalk the man was still on the other side of the four laned road and had just stepped off the sidewalk. Had I been a few seconds later, and he further towards the middle of the road, I could understand a ticket, but this seemed ridiculous!)

“Sir, please! I’m getting married this weekend and we are just on our way…” I nearly wailed.

“You say you are getting married this weekend?” The officer asked.

“Yes!”

“Alright ma’am, enjoy the weekend…” and he let me go. Thank god. But who gets stopped in a “sting operation” for pedestrians crossing the road??? I’ve never even heard of that! And of course, P’s family saw me get pulled over by the cops again. They must think I’m the worst driver on the planet, and that their poor son takes his life in his hands every time he drives with me! I promise I’m not. I may not be the best driver, but my driving certainly doesn’t warrant so many cop interventions in the past two weeks!

We had dinner (without any more police officer issues, although I was teased that I shouldn’t be allowed to drive anymore), then went home to have birthday cake. Since P’s mom is a vegetarian who doesn’t eat eggs I had earlier gone searching for an eggless Vegan birthday cake. We sang happy birthday to U, and D and I ceremoniously smushed the birthday cake into U’s face.

P said he had "photographic proof" of my cake smushing debauchery... but I wasn't alone, D also helped :)

See… I’m a cake smusher, through and through. I’ve had cakes smushed on me, and I’ve smushed cake on others. P knows this, and he was worried that I would smush our wedding cake into his mouth as well. He’d been warning (begging?) me for months not to, and because I love him, I had decided not to, but had to get the cake smushing out of my system at least once that weekend.

That Thursday the C family and P family spent the night together—My mom, sisters and I in my bedroom (on an air mattress, and on our bed), P and U were in the living room, and P’s parents were in the guest room.

At the close of the night, only one day remained until we had our first wedding.

That was one thing that astounded P’s dad when he visited for the first time… that a car will stop for you if you attempt to cross the road. When I saw him later in the year in KTM he kept saying, “Look C, look! Here they will not stop for you!”